Quality Chop House - Farringdon

88-94 Farringdon Rd, Clerkenwell, London EC1R 3EA

I have to be a little careful here. Our trip to Quality Chop House was a birthday meal, from me to my girlfriend. Any criticism I deliver, then, surely waters down the present and probably means I owe her something else to make up the difference.

But, I’m nothing if not a hero - and here, I’m going to take a bullet, water down the present slightly, so my audience (hey Mum) doesn’t make the same mistake we did.

Quality Chop House is the sort of small, Dickensian styled restaurant that American tourists fantasise about. It’s all tweed, booths, creaking chairs, dust, and old (empty) bottles of wine. A film set straight out of Dickens’s best work, The Muppet Christmas Carol.

We squeezed in, on a hot evening, next to a really quiet couple who looked seriously, seriously displeased to hear me. Dust blew in the light wind that breezed through the open door, the sounds of traffic and the mating call of drunks carried in from the street, while a clock ticked quietly in the corner.

And God, how it ticked. And ticked. And ticked some more. Counting down the minutes (all ten of them) between us sitting down and ordering a drink - and the further ten between ordering that drink and having it on the table.

Champagne, that was all. The order wasn’t complicated. The order wasn’t unusual (surely). Yet, the waiter told us twice that it was ‘on it’s way’ - Christ only knows how deep their cellars are.

The champagne (it might have been a sparkling wine, actually) was an accident, it said on the menu - discovered when the producer tried to create a different drink. It tasted like one too.

Another accident was the word ‘Chop’ above the restaurant door.

Maybe I have this all wrong, but in my view, a chop house has to major on meat. I mean seriously major on meat.

Mondale to Hart - where’s the beef?

Seriously, where was the beef? Everyone around us seemed to be chomping through some massive t-bone action; the sort of steak that toppled cars 10,000 years ago. It was absent from the menu, though. Not a cut of cow in sight.

We asked and, apparently, QCH has a limited supply - they only order as much as they think they’ll need for the weekend.

This was Friday. At 8pm. At a chop house. How many vegans had they booked in for the weekend? How many people were going to come in and order leek soup? Come on! People want meat! People expect meat, at a chop house. And you’ve run out, at 8pm on a Friday, in central London, a ten minute walk from Smithfield Market - Smithfield, ‘the largest wholesale meat market in the UK’ (thanks Wikipedia).

Not only that, but clearly the chefs are strong with their meat game. The asparagus I had to start was tough, saltless, and boring.

Anyway, with no beef, we went for lamb. Solid, dependable lamb, cooked three ways, served on a big sharing plate, with a couple of sides - and an extra order of potatoes, which they also stored in that deep, dark, cavernous cellar. We tried our best. We chewed slowly. We took deep breathes, big pauses, and talked about the weather. We eked out the meal for as long as we physically could; but, those potatoes had to be eaten, unaccompanied, in place of a dessert.

There’s a few lessons for the restaurant industry here. First, sort your s**t out. It’s Friday night, it’s a popular time for people to eat and spend money, you’re going to busy - bring your A-game; don’t be dithering around, neglecting to take orders, and keeping your champagne and half your menu in the next postcode.

Secondly, get people a drink. Straight away. Demand they have one. Offer them something good from the list. We’re a couple, we’re ever so slightly dressed up and looking a bit tipsy - tip the wine list down our throats; chances are we’ll pay for half of it.

Finally, if you’re a chop house, your menu should rival Noah’s Ark. There should be meat-stacked-upon-meat-stacked-upon-meat - and if you’re buying, cutting, preparing, or whatever on a Friday for the weekend, do double. Last time I checked, meat keeps and sells for more when it does.

Anyway, if you’re in the area, don’t just take my word for it - give Quality Chop House a try; or, walk around the corner to Exmouth Market and the many, many decent restaurants on that street.

Social Eating House - Soho, London

58 Poland St, Soho, London W1F 7NS

This really isn’t a blog, is it? To qualify as a blog, I think you need some degree of regularity in your posts and what are mine? Months apart?

Yeah, the last one was in February, so I’m on for sixth in a month. That’s a pace so far removed from blogging, it’s glacial.

You also need some knowledge on the subject, don’t you? Or - at the very least - a passion for it.

I love food, because it keeps me full (for a short while). I love food, because it’s tasty. And, I love restaurants, because they provide the food. I’m not particularly passionate about them, as an industry. New openings in far-flung East London archways and the latest fad cuisine of an Inuit take on Peruvian street food, I really don’t care for.

So, what you’re only ever reading on this website is an uninformed ramble, by an ill-educated (when it comes to food), passion-less, permanently hungry keyboard jockey, who wouldn’t last five minutes serving tables, frying steaks, cutting up vegetables, or washing up.

Actually, that’s not true. I once washed dishes for 8 months. It felt like prison.

As ever, this is a long winded way of getting to the point - which is this: if you’re a chef, foodie, or a random passerby, someone I know or someone I don’t, please don’t be offended by anything you read here, as what I say carries very little meaning and even less weight.

Anyway, on to Social Eating House.

I have to be a bit careful here. I was taken here for my birthday, didn’t pay a penny towards the meal, and already had a few cocktails before we arrived; so, I’d better be careful what I say.

Hands up if you’ve ever eaten at a chef’s table? Some of you? Yes? Good.

Well, for those who haven’t, it’s simple - you sit in the kitchen, quite near the pass (the bit where the head chef checks the food before it goes out), close enough to see the meat sizzle, feel a little of the stove’s heat, and hear the c-bomb whenever it’s dropped.

And, boy, was it dropped!

Well, twice; but right after I complained (quite loudly) that the chef hadn’t used the c-word yet.

Talk about service!

Social Eating House is one of Jason Atherton’s restaurants. That means it could be excellent, as it was at Pollen Street Social (aside from that awful excuse for a pudding) - or, it could be fairly ‘meh’, at it was at Sosharu; so, I drew a line down the middle and expected it to be good.

And good, it turned out to be. Very good, in fact. Not excellent (that’s a rare score for this skinny Michelin Man wannabe to give); but, a ‘very good’ from me is that kind of score the chef should print out and stick to the fridge with a magnet.

Honestly, he should!

Starting with mackerel and finishing with milk tart, we took in a series of ‘modern European’ dishes of rabbit, sea bass, foie gras, and the like. You know, that sort of English meets French food, all done posh, and served in very small pieces - except for that foie gras.

Man, was that a lot of liver. Too much for me. I find foie gras sickly at the best of times and I was far happier with the root vegetable broth it was floating on. Mmmm...broth. I really am a peasant at heart.

The rabbit, I found disappointing - quite bland in the main, but with the odd burst of a slightly unpleasant flavour I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

The sea bass, on the other hand, was fantastic. If I remember rightly, it sat on mash. Rich, creamy, butter stuffed mash. I really really am a peasant.

To wash this all down was wine - lots of wine and some French pear cider, which seemed to arrive just at my glass was empty. Perfect timing.

And, in a way, that’s the real point of the chef’s table experience. It’s less about the food (although, obviously, that’s still massively important) and more about being treated better than the other customers. You’re not just any old schmuck, but minor royalty for a couple of hours, sitting behind a curtain that says ‘No Entry’ and given a private performance by the entire kitchen staff.

Sure, the rabbit was odd. Okay, the foie gras wasn’t for me. Put all that aside, though, as for two hours this peasant felt way more important than usual - and, better yet, he wasn’t paying a penny.

The Importance of Service

Various

With annoying frequency, the age-old debate about the value of service is kicked from its slumber. Whether it accounts for twenty, thirty, fifty, or any other percentage of a dining experience, the fact that the debate exists shows that it's an important element of a meal.

The debate still misses the point, mind you. It suggests that service can be split into an exclusive part, separate from location and food.

It can't.

You might visit a restaurant in an uninspiring location, because the food is excellent. You might visit a restaurant with average food, because of an incredible or convenient location. You won't visit a restaurant with poor service. Period.

While location relates to accessibility (or the view) and food the substance, service relates directly to the enjoyment of the experience. Was it easy to get to? Yes. Did you like the food? Yes. Did you enjoy yourself? No.

That's not a score of 66%. That's a zero. You won't visit that restaurant again, nor will you recommend it.

So, good service isn't important, it's essential, and no restaurant should underestimate its importance, ever.

Good service is only the beginning, however; it dictates whether or not you enjoy a meal, while great service dictates how much you'll spend.

Logistically, between the customer and the kitchen, lies service. Financially, between the customers wallet and the till, lies the same. Waiters are there to explain the menu and take an order. Within that process lies the opportunity to guide the customer towards an aperitif, a particular starter, the specials, a digestif, the cheese, and another bottle of wine.

The skill of the waiter is to make this up-sell seem perfectly natural; a suggestion to enhance a meal, not a cold-call sale. Would I like some olives? No. No I wouldn't. Would I like a snack while I consider the menu? Yes. I'm hungry, of course I would.

The difference for an individual customer is relatively small, the difference for a restaurant, magnified across a table, a sitting, a day, a week, a month, is potentially huge.

Take a table of seven people arriving at a crowded restaurant only to find space at the bar. They're hungry, they're through the door, and they've sat down. That's seven mouths, seven stomachs, and seven wallets, sat in your restaurant. A poor waiter takes and delivers a single drinks order - £7 each; £49 in total. A good waiter converts this to two drinks - £14 each; £98 in total. A great waiter upgrades the order to include bar snacks - £20 each; £140 in total. The greatest waiter keeps them happy at the bar and works to finds them a table - ££ each; £££ in total.

Three recent examples demonstrated that even the most fashionable and sought-after restaurants don’t get service right - at least not all the time. Whether it’s extreme aloofness in Soho or damn-right rudeness in Hoxton or the City, these three restaurants lost pounds from that day’s taking and subsequent pounds from potential future visits.

I’m sure the owners, sat high in their counting houses, won’t worry about the missing pounds from a single bill. For now, these restaurants are popular, no doubt profitable, and with queues around the corner on most nights, there isn’t a cloud in their business plan's sky. Over the long-term though, customer disappointment leads to a slippery slope of increasingly bad press, fewer tables, fewer bums on seats, stagnation, and possibly failure.

It’s important, then, that no restaurant should underestimate importance of service - ever.

The Fish & Chip Shop - Liverpool Street

Dashwood House 69 Old Broad Street, London, EC2M 1NA

What do tourists eat in England? That's right, fish 'n' chips. Great big pieces of questionable white fish, lathered in a thick soggy batter, and fried in oil so filthy it could pass for crude. They'll pay dearly for the privilege and leave thinking England's culinary excellence is as overstated as its football team. A big 'Thank you!' to every chain-owned pub around Covent Garden.

It doesn't have to be like this and The Fish & Chip Shop shows how it should be done. Delicate white fish, encased in a light crisp batter. That's it, nothing else needs to be said - on the fish at least.

The Fish & Chip Shop 'chain' have two restaurants, one in Islington and one in the City. Tucked along an alleyway just off Liverpool Street, next door to the picturesque lawn of a church, and opposite the old Dollhouse Gentleman's Club, this new branch sparkles warmly through an L-shaped wall of glass. Inside, an oval bar is surrounded by small round tables for four and booths for a couple more. It's clean, crisp like the fish, and very welcoming - the theatrics of the guy on the door would please the tourists too.

Served promptly and politely, with two courses polished off in an hour, there aren't many complaints from me really. The insistence on bringing my food in separate bowls is a slight gripe. The fish looked lonely and less than impressive sat on its own. This is a hearty meal and I want to see a piping hot plate, spilling over as chips fight fish fight peas for the precious space of the enamel. The chips are the wrong sort too. They're fat, but they crunch. Where are the soggy chips that fall apart in your hands as you overload them with ketchup or curry sauce?

The minor gripes aside, plus an additional one for glass of ice with my beer (really? I don't know what that's about), I'd give The Fish & Chip Shop a healthy seal of approval, if I gave out such things. Definitely worth a visit if the queue for Poppies is too staggeringly huge, which it always seems to be.

Gremio de Brixton - Brixton

The Crypt, St Matthews Church, Effra Rd, London, SW2 1JF

Is it sacrilege to transform a church into a restaurant? Those who paid for the memorial plaques that now adorn the wall of MEATmission in Shoreditch would probably say so, overlooking as they now do tables of lairy people forcing wads of beef, cheese, and chilli through their teeth. The crypt at St Matthew’s in Brixton is a different story though, and I for one would convert to the cult of Gremio de Brixton and their delicious tapas. Hallelujah and praise be to the chef. Besides, upstairs is still a working church, rather than a nightclub.

I expected more of a Christopher Lee’s bedroom feel from Gremio, given the location. A Disney themed restaurant, where dust and bones litter the floor, upturned coffins are used as tables, and the kitchen is hidden behind a wall of cobwebs. Disappointingly, Gremio is a clean well-lit space, with velvet on the walls, and an exposed kitchen showing chefs hard at work preparing various meats. Half the floor space is given over to a lively bar with loud music. The clear segregation worked well on a Friday, preventing the music from ruining diners’ meals and our loud conversation from ruining drinkers’ drinks. Whether our conversation ruined dinner for other diners, I can only guess.

This being a Friday, sangria and red wine were - mistakenly it later transpired - ordered in vast quantity. I know sangria is a summer drink, but it’s warm in the crypt and the lightness of the drink helps clean the palate between dishes, of which there were a great many. Tapas is always hard for the English, we’re not great at sharing - too polite to stretch across our neighbours dinner and take without asking. English tapas generally descends into awkward requests for things we don’t want and the feeling that you’ve not had quite as much as you’re going to pay for. The word sorry reverberates around the table with comic frequency. Of course, the drink helped ease tensions, but so did the order of four sharing platters, bread, and all 18 of the warm tapas dishes on offer - most of which landed on our table at exactly the same time. This was an overwhelming amount of food and more than enough to keep each of us from feeling cheated. Although, we did order another ox cheek once we cleared the last plate, that being the standout dish of the meal. The ox cheek tasted like the velvet of the curtains were it cooked for fourteen hours. The words soft and creamy wouldn’t begin to describe it. This was smoothness I haven’t tasted since I cut a steak with a spoon in Argentina. Unbelievable and worth ordering two, even if every mouthful thrust the dagger of glutton further in to my stomach. The rest of the tapas was equally well cooked, but always limited by not being the cheek. Classic tapas of small succulent prawns dripping in oil, tiny calamari, cheese croquettes, ham after ham, cheese after cheese, delicious warm bread drizzled with a sweet olive oil - the list continues. And, for the accurate Spanish experience a dearth of vegetable, except for the two lettuce leaves served with each dish - purely for decorative use I understand. But who needs anything green though when you have an ox cheek that tantalising and enough wine to keep Holy Communion running for two months.

Tramshed - Shoreditch

32 Rivington Street, London, EC2A 3LX

According to the Metro, Shoreditch has lost its edge. No longer the refuge of dead-beat artists clawing an existence from the gutter, where carrying a lowly iPhone 3 would get you mugged, Shoreditch is now a candy land for the affluent, with Liverpool Street suits wandering up for lunch at a high street eatery or over-priced poncery. These days the Gucci-clad thieves won't give you a second glance unless your iPhone 5 carries an 's'.

Perhaps Shoreditch has lost its edge. I've no idea. I haven't worked here for that long. What I can say is that I'd rather trade edge for security, impoverished artists for cash points, and salmonella for quality food. Shoreditch is awash with good places to eat. Of a lunchtime, you can glutton your way from Old Street to High Street, and back again, on cheap eats, eye-watering bills, and everything in between. Try doing that in Harlesden.

Just off the glutton trail, tucked down Rivington Street, is a surprisingly large hall that is Tramshed. Owned by a renowned chef (Mark Hix), with a Damien Hirst centre-piece, and occupying a building that could house no less than a hundred wannabe Yokos, Tramshed is everything the Metro must hate.

Tipping its hat to edgy credentials, at Tramshed you can dine almost exclusively on steak and chicken - I presume a vegetarian option is available, but they'd probably have to blow the dust off it first. The litmus test - steak and chips - was passed with flying colours, although I would say my steak was slightly more medium than rare. Bonus points too for being only the second place I've visited which serves Oxford Sauce. I just don't understand why this delicious, spicy brown, anchovy infused condiment isn't more widely available.

A series of sides accompanied our meal, but having foregone the recommended Oyster Ale (5.5%) in favour of champagne, I really can't remember what they were. I do recall the pudding, although I challenge anyone to forget a bowl of molten chocolate served with marshmallows and donut batter for dipping. I can also recall the envy felt for my friend's chicken and steak sandwich. Half the price of my meal and looking just as filling, if not more tasty, with crisp pieces of chicken skin poking out from each side.

When you next wade through the endless high street chains clogging the streets of Shoreditch, lamenting the disappearance of all those oh-so-trendy artists and violent muggings, turn to Rivington Street, visit Tramshed, and within minutes you just won't care.

The Duke of Cambridge - Islington

The Duke of Cambridge in Islington couldn't be more different to that in Stockwell. Perhaps a comment on equality in London or the division between North and South. Islington's Duke of Cambridge is an organic pub, it's unlikely that anyone in that anyone in Stockwell's Duke of Cambridge can spell organic.

Tucked off Islington Green, amongst the white stucco, Miliband heartland houses, The Duke of Cambridge is an old fashioned London corner pub with cavernous bar at the front and ramshackle outhouse style restaurant at the back. Offering all organic beer and food, with a nod toward a fish specialism. It has that family-friendly North London pram brigade feel.

Unfortunately, whilst first impressions were good, the promising menu, handwritten in chalk, didn't deliver. A salad of small cubed belly pork and various leaves was fine. The main of bean and cheese bake was dry, cloying, and could have been used to repoint a wall. Pudding was probably nice, if I could remember what I had. I remember leaving half a bowl of raisins, but the fact I can't recall epitomises the food - bland and boring.

Perhaps I'll call in to the namesakes in Stockwell and peruse their menu.

Bill's - Oxford

The chapel on St Michael's Street which Bill's occupies was formerly the home of The Gatehouse. I worked there for a little while, spending one evening a week distributing donuts from Sainsbury's and sandwiches from Pret to Oxford's homeless.

Redecorated in metal and pine - no doubt by Tipsy McStagger himself - the chapel now branded Bill's is unrecognisable. Unfortunately, so is the food. After being served cold chips and a burger which had the texture of wet toilet paper, I pinned for the various high street fodder previously served up to those in need. As for the service, best not to ask.

I can't understand where or how Bill's fits on the high street. The menu is eclectic, the quality of the ingredients poor, and the cooking just as bad - they can't even get a burger right, the litmus test of most high street trofferies.

Screw the artisan jams from Uncle Bill's larder lining the wall as you leave. I've visited Bill's twice now, and I won't be making that mistake again.

Fallowfields - Oxforshire

I've eaten in some odd and empty places before, but none so odd and empty as Fallowfields. 

A country house/farm to the south of Oxford, the semi-permanant marque in the garden suggests the restaurant is aiming to take more from serving weddings than from day-trip punters. The food itself was fine, apart from a sickly rich gravy on the main and an overly complicated pudding. The location, however, was a cavernous room with only three tables filled, where Andrew Bocelli wailed quietly on a continuous loop and a mere whisper could be heard by all.

Once the boss came to dine with some minions, the attention of the waiting staffs evaporated and we had to retrieve the bill ourselves. Couple that with the sight of two kitchen staff (God I hope not the chef) walking past the window fag in mouth, and any enjoyment was plucked clean from the experience.

The beer was a single saving grace. A pint from Compass Brewery (I missed which one), the quality of which Fallowfields could learn from.